Coach Quentin Hillsman Quotes
Opening Statement:
“First games are tough, and the thing about playing someone the first game of the season is that you have very limited scouting material. They had a few players that came out and did a few things that we didn’t think they would do, and they hadn’t been doing in the past. I thought (FDU’s Alyssa Mayrose) had an unbelievable game. We had about five tapes from last year. We had a lot of stuff that was old, and it’s funny, the two plays that we had right were the back door play, and they scored twice, and we knew the flex, and they scored on that. We defended everything we didn’t know, so I guess we have to stop doing scouting reports. Obviously, you guys know me, I take the ‘W’ any day. I am happy to be back here at the podium, starting a new year, and it’s an honor to still be coaching and to still have great players and to still be at a great university, and I don’t take this for granted and neither do our players. We always talk about being grateful and having gratitude for the opportunity to play the game. It was just fun, last year was a year where we went through a lot of ups and downs. I thought we were really settled in. To have a game where (junior guard) Erica (Morrow) has 10 points and (senior guard) Nicole (Michael) has 11 points and they go 9-for-24 and you still win by 20. Last year that wouldn’t have happened, we would have lost. I think that says a lot about our depth, it was very good. We did a very good job of not fouling them. That was one of the things we said, we didn’t want to get them into one-and-one, and I don’t think they did the entire game. We actually did a very good job in our game plan at halftime. We went in and changed a few things and they shot 16 percent in the second half. I thought we did a very good job defensively in the second half. I can’t say enough about our young kids. (Freshman center) Kayla Alexander had a very strong game. (Freshman guard) Carmen Tyson-Thomas played really well for us. In her minutes I thought she did a good job of rebounding the basketball. Our young kids have really helped us and just what I thought they would do; come and provide us with a little bit of balance and depth. They played double-digit minutes in their first collegiate game and it was just very good to see.”
On the adjustments made at halftime:
“We just knew that we had to stop the two players that were scoring. It was an adjustment of not running around so much. We were pressing a lot and they were getting threes in transition so we backed the pressure off a couple steps. We tried to keep them in front of us and stop the ball, whether it was on the dribble or whether it was on the pass. I thought that their three main players that we were worried about were (Mariyah Laury), (Jordan Sykes), and (Alyssa Mayrose). They really played a great game. Between those three players they had about 30 points. They did a great job, they have a very good coach and he runs great stuff. His stuff I’m going to take and put in my playbook. I’m going to keep it and run it against Rutgers and UConn. They really run some really good stuff. It was nice watching the tapes and saying, ‘They run some really good stuff,’ and trying to get your players prepared for that was pretty difficult. “
On what he thought of the team’s turnovers:
“Well, obviously not good. We had 21 of them. I thought that the number got inflated down the stretch. I think we had about 16 going into the last few minutes of the game, and then we started subbing and it went off of somebody’s leg. I’d say that out of 21 we got three three-second calls, so I think that eight or nine of them were probably just from playing hard. We say that we’re going to go in there (the paint) and we’re going to post-up. If they call three-seconds we’re going to live with it. The three-second calls, we’re going to get two or three of those a game because we’re going to play at the rim and play at the basket.”
On how many turnovers can be attributed to it being the first game of the season:
“I don’t know if it’s so much being the first game of the year as it’s being real aggressive. We were pushing the ball a lot more, we were taking more shots. We’re getting up and down the floor and we’re playing at the rim. We have Kayla (Alexander) inside, and she’s really posting at the rim. We have Vionca (Murray) and Troya (Berry) in there posting at the rim. We’re going to get some three-second calls. Those things are not going to change; we’re going to play at the rim. We’re going to be in the paint, and if they call three-second, were going to live with that.”
On the play of Kayla Alexander:
“Kayla is amazing. I am glad she’s here. When we were recruiting her, she was one of those players that we said we had to get. If we didn’t get anybody else in the class, we had to get her. That was our number one priority. Then of course we have Carmen (Tyson-Thomas) and Lacey (Elashier Hall). We just went for need. We had to get two very good guards, we got Carmen and we got Lacey, and we knew we had to get somebody to help Vionca (Murray) out. Kayla is going to score a lot of points and get a lot of rebounds at this place and we’re just lucky to have her.”
On Kayla Alexander’s turnovers:
“I think it was just a first college game thing. She missed a few things at the rim that she didn’t miss the whole pre-season. The first thing that we always say is how she is so great at keeping the ball high; the first thing she does is bring the ball down and get tied up. I think it’s just having a few freshman jitters, but she won’t have those jitters on Monday, I’ll tell you that.”
On what he is most disappointed with:
“Probably turnovers. The first half I kind of knew could have gone either way, just because of the scouting aspect. We got 10 tapes from last year. They haven’t played anybody this year so we didn’t have anything on them this year. We watched 10 tapes and we told our players that we don’t know what they’re going to run, but we’re going to prepare as if they are going to run everything that they ran last year. The things that we prepared for, like I said, were the flex, and the baseline double-screen in the back door. Overall, I’m very happy with the win, and I’ll take that any day, and I think we took too many threes.”
On what he thought of the defense in the second-half:
“Unbelievable. 16 percent shooting in the second-half for them. We did a really good job. We just locked them down. We said, ‘We’re not going to let those players that were scoring points for them score points, make somebody else score.’ That was the goal, to not let those two players that were getting off on us in the first half. We don’t let them get off, we thought we could win the basketball game.”
On taking the press off in the second half:
“We did, but we did increase the pressure on those two players. What was happening was they were getting loose on us in transition. We said we were going to keep them in front of us. I think that overall we knew that they were thin, we knew they had nine players. We said we were going to keep pushing. In the second half, they’re a very good ball club, but I think they just got worn down a little bit from having nine players who could play. We played every player on our roster.”
On the importance of the team’s depth:
“It was huge. If you look at the minutes, we played Nicole Michael 23 minutes, when was the last time you saw that? She’s been playing in the thirties, and even Erica (Morrow) played 28 minutes, normally she’s playing 30, 35, 36 minutes. I think that overall, tonight, we did a very good job. I think that the one person I have to mention is Lynnae Lampkins, I thought that she really came out and she pushed the tempo. She did a very good job on defense, and I was really proud of her effort. She and Tasha (Harris) played a very good game on the floor. I thought that Tasha had two turnovers late that inflated her turnovers up to four. She was having a pretty good game before.”
